


the sunset hours

by commovente



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Puppies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-14
Updated: 2016-02-14
Packaged: 2018-05-20 04:18:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5991442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/commovente/pseuds/commovente
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>set in an alternate sendai city where everything is almost exactly the same, except every day during sunset, each person's heart is visible to everyone else, in whatever form that may be, for better or for worse.</p><p>in which kyoutani has an actual puppy dog heart, yahaba is the most unconventional disney character alive, and oikawa is still the best senpai.</p><p>or: the story of yahaba's adventures in the big city.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the sunset hours

**Author's Note:**

> hi there! 
> 
> this was written for the haikyuu valentine's exchange, in which i originally intended to write yahaba/kyoutani in a metropolis, but then magical realism happened, thus resulting in this low-key fantastical 'verse. nevertheless, i hope you still find it an enjoyable read!
> 
> happy valentine's day <3

picture this: 

a city that comes to life at night, or a city that never truly falls asleep to start with. a city that somehow, inexplicably, manages to be both at the same time. 

sprawling roads lined with zelkova trees, narrow streets and lines of bright light bathed in the afterglow of sunlight. billboards and street signs and advertisements — all the city’s painted walls — their outer layers peeling back in the night to reveal the heart of everything, the beneath the beneath. in this light, the shadows and sidewalk are friends, their whispers as real as any of the people who live here, who walk these streets.

anything could happen here and, you never know, maybe it does. 

maybe it’s happening right now.

 

 

sendai changes at sunset. 

shigeru’s seen it, feels how the city glows just a little bit fuller as the sun touches the edge of the sky. he’s sendai born and bred, and he might not have lived in the heart of the city all his life but none of this should feel strange or new to him, not like this. still, he stares out the window of an apartment he hasn’t yet learned to call home, watches the clouds rise above the setting sun.  

pushed along by some distant roaring wind, he feels his own heart rise up to meet it, a tiny current of air stretching out into endless new horizons, thinking maybe it might find someone else there, too. 

 

 

he finds the dog on his way back to the apartment.  

shigeru’s alright with his directions, but he usually finds it easier to hold a picture in his head than navigate through it in real life. it’s probably one of the reasons his parents let him move out for college so early, a solid few weeks before classes begin. shigeru distantly remembers the twinge of fond exasperation he’d felt being gifted a map by watari just before he left (‘welcome to the city of trees,’ it reads, hovering over the map’s top right corner).

right now, though? there’s not a single tree in sight and, staring at said map so he doesn’t have to look at streets he doesn’t recognise in the slightest, shigeru feels his previous irritation fade into the embarrassing realisation that he’s lost.  

he’s about ready to concede defeat — and maybe call watari for help while he’s at it, speech prepped and ready in his head: _no shinji, i’m not panicking actually, so please just shut up and help me_ — when he hears it.

 _lost,_ a tiny voice echoes behind him. _no no no, lost, lost, lost._

shigeru turns.

it’s a dog. well, more like a puppy if he goes by the size, a husky with fur that reminds shigeru of toasted marshmallows — a golden retriever/husky mix, maybe? — when the dog notices shigeru’s heard him. 

approaching shigeru, it crouches by his feet, head bowed and miserable. 

“hey there,” shigeru murmurs, bending down. he keeps his hands to himself, though, years of _stranger danger!_ and _dogs can bite, you know_ still very much present in his head.

but the dog ignores him, howling to itself, a tiny paw trampling on the edge of shigeru’s shoe as it fidgets in distress.

shigeru’s face twitches.

“don’t just sit there and whine,” he says, hand reaching to ruffle the fur between the dog’s ears roughly. “i’m lost too, you know.”

the dog stops, looks up at shigeru.

 _lost?_ it barks hopefully, and shigeru blinks. 

he looks around and up, only now realising the sun setting low behind him as he realises this is No Ordinary Dog he’s petting, this is someone’s, someone’s —

a hot gust of air bursts over where shigeru’s standing, and he waves it away, not liking the way it makes people walking past look from shigeru to the dog to the lingering breeze in surprise. 

“you shouldn’t be on your own like this,” he tells the dog, hand gentler in its petting. he’s a little embarrassed but mostly at a loss as to what to do, because, well, what else is he supposed to do? he’s got someone’s heart in his hands. literally.

 _heart,_ the dog repeats, and yahaba thinks, _great, it’s sensitive to other people’s thoughts, too._

the dog’s ears wilt, but it stands up like it might put up a fight if yahaba keeps trash talking (thinking?) it, except all yahaba can think is how alone it looks, trying to put up a tough face when it’s obvious how scared it is.

so yahaba sighs, thinking he’ll probably regret it but lifting the dog up into his arms anyway, ignoring how cheerful the dog’s yaps of _lost, lost_ have gotten.

“yeah,” shigeru says anyway, adds on, “you’re okay though. you’re okay,” not sure which one of them he’s trying to reassure. 

scratching under the dog’s neck, shigeru thinks it’s alright if he looks after the dog till it can find its way back later, after the sun’s down completely. he thinks _the city’s home to everyone, in the end,_ as he turns right onto a street shigeru hopes is more familiar than the last.

 

 

true enough, the dog disappears as night finds its way over the sky. yahaba curls his fingers loosely in his lap, still warm from where the dog was lying down. he’d found his way back to the apartment in the end, the dog bolting up the stairs of the complex ahead of him. 

fujiwara-san, the landlady, had come out to see what all the noise was about, ready to shoo the dog back out when she realised what the dog was. the dog dashes back to duck between shigeru’s legs, and fujiwara-san fusses over them both for a good half-minute.

“i’m sorry, yahaba-kun,” she tells shigeru as he fishes out his keys. “i didn’t realise you’ve been keeping yourself quiet all this time.”

shigeru stops, tries to tell her _don’t worry about it_ , tries to tell her _this isn’t actually me, you weren’t wrong_ but fujiwara-san excuses herself and shigeru’s left with a fluffy dog jumping up against his legs, barking _shigeru, shigeru_ over and over again, as real as anything shigeru’s ever felt. 

he hears the faint stir of downtown traffic drift in through the open window, and sunset’s long gone but shigeru could swear he feels a cold gust of air settle inside his apartment all the same.

 

 

shigeru’s ready to mark The Dog Incident as some incredible fluke the next day, the dreamy quality surrounding shigeru’s memories of last sunset already planting the first seeds of doubt. after all, having an animal manifestation during the sunset hour (he doesn’t actually know what everyone else calls it; it’s always been there, it never seemed to warrant a name, natural as breathing) is already pretty uncommon — scientists have all sorts of theories to explain it, but most people generally agree it’s just really hard to have that much heart to share with the rest of the world — but to have your heart stretch out so far away without even knowing how to find its way back seems near unthinkable.

(for all his flights of fancy, however fleeting they may be, shigeru’s sure his own bursts of wind at sunset don’t stretch any further than he can see, which is to say they go nowhere at all.)

 

 

“hey, oikawa-san,” shigeru begins.

it’s a slow day today — kotodaikoen station’s a few blocks away from the city office and kotodai park, but when it’s this hot between the morning and lunchtime rush, there’s not nearly enough people for shigeru to convince himself people will care if he talks a little on the job. 

that is, of course, assuming oikawa lets his work ethic turn as questionable as shigeru feels beneath an uncommonly warm spring sky. 

well, that and the donald duck kigurumi shigeru’s got himself stuck in three days a week until classes start.

( _the ideal vacation job,_ watari promised him. _all you have to do is dress up and hand people flyers a few days a week. disney’s pay rates aren’t bad either, you know._

at the time, shigeru had agreed. but now, trying to entice busy people to the disney store six sweltering blocks away? no, thank you.)

“donald-chan,” oikawa says brightly, sounding completely serious at the same time. “my sincerest apologies — i didn’t quite catch what you just said.”

shigeru holds in a sigh.

“stitch…san,” he tries, letting the sigh out with relief when oikawa nods encouragingly. “can i ask you a question?”

“why, of course! what else are friends for?”

hands on his hips, the only thing more incredible than oikawa’s acting skills is how he simultaneously manages to make shigeru feel encouraged but terrifyingly nervous, all at once. in a stitch kigurumi, to boot.

shigeru doesn’t know how to segue into what he wants to ask, so he says it straight up: “do you you think a heart can go far away?”

oikawa stills, and shigeru hastily presses on. “on their own, i mean. do you think it’s possible?”

“i think,” oikawa says, lifting up his hood to stare at shigeru significantly. “you’re looking for an answer that doesn’t fit your question.”

shigeru shifts uncomfortably. a moment passes in silence, then two, and oikawa bursts into a sunny smile, making a thumbs up with his hand. 

“that said! i’m sure whoever he is, wherever he is, he’ll be back before you know it.”

“oikawa-san, i’m not trying to be romantic, here,” shigeru says, ignoring both oikawa’s implication and choice of pronoun.

“hm? but whatever makes you think, yahaba-chan, that i’m not being honest, too?” and with that oikawa shoves his stitch hood back on, lifting a flyer from his stack to ambush unsuspecting passersby with his charm:

“good morning! lovely day, don’t you think? say, have you been to sendai’s disney store? it’s only a few blocks from here…”

  

 

shigeru doesn’t notice oikawa had used his name until he’s almost halfway to the apartment later in the afternoon. what he does notice, however, is the nagging suspicion that even then, oikawa hadn’t really been talking to shigeru at all.

(there’s all kinds of ways to want, after all, and desperation’s not the worst way to convince yourself of anything.)

it’s almost the sunset hour again, and shigeru doesn’t think he has any space to want and wait for things he doesn’t know for sure will return, or were ever there to begin with, so he walks a step or two faster.

this time around, he finds his way back without any trouble.

 

 

except when he gets back to the apartment complex, the dog’s there, too. 

 _shigeru,_ it runs up to him, darting from side to side. _shigeru, hey, shigeru!_

“i thought you left,” shigeru says. 

 _left?_ the dog tilts its head to the side, tail slowing to think it over. _left? oh, lost!_

the dog tries to clamber onto shigeru, sounding distressed. _shigeru….lost?_

and shigeru laughs. there’s nothing funny, but he laughs all the same.

“no,” he says, lifting the dog into his arms. “i’m not. but don’t you think you are?”

he receives several licks to the face in response, wet but rough like a cat, which is weird, but okay. this is how shigeru finds himself sitting with his strange newfound company through sunset hour again, stroking the dog’s fur while a breeze runs soft through his hair.

staring out the window, shigeru follows the criss-crossing lines of telephone wires mimic shadowy skyscraper silhouettes. the dog nuzzles closer against him. its fur is gorgeous in this light, all sunset warm and night-sky smooth. shigeru’s thinking far too many thoughts to frame into a single sentence, but he does his best.

“what’s your name, i wonder?”

the dog lifts its head, licking into the palm of shigeru’s hand. there’s a wind rattling the glass of the window, whether shigeru’s or someone else’s or perhaps even the city’s itself, its hard to say.

opening its mouth to — speak? bark? shigeru’s not sure what the dog sounds like to everyone else; maybe its just a voice you understand, reason having nothing to do with it — the dog stretches up, leaning on its two hind legs.

with the dog’s nose against his neck, shigeru waits, almost sure he heard something before the dog’s gone from his sight again, somewhere shigeru’s arms, still locked in a circle where the dog stood, don’t know how to reach.

 

 

he’s almost late to work the next morning, skidding around corners, too haphazard to tell definitively if he’s going the right way, but also too fast to despair in case he isn’t.

and, apparently, fast enough to run straight into somebody else, ambling along the opposite way shigeru’s heading.

“ah, shit.” shigeru gets back up onto his feet, unreasonably prepared to let off some steam and chew whoever out for about ten seconds before he has to dash again. he might be petty — and more than a little short tempered, it’s true — but shigeru’s always been aware of his shortcomings. 

that is, until he sees whoever-it-is has yet to sit back up from the ground. there’s a fleeting moment between shigeru spotting the guy on the ground and moving over to help him, which shigeru spends sending a prayer up into the skies for — the guy to not be dead? shigeru to somehow _still_ manage not being late? sendai may never know.

awkwardly, he moves to hunch over the guy, sticking a finger against his neck to feel out for a pulse when a hand shoots up to grab shigeru’s wrist. shigeru jolts, but the grip holds tight and honestly, if whoever this is can hold onto him this tight, surely shigeru hasn’t caused any lasting damage.

still holding onto shigeru’s wrist, the guy hauls himself back up, and shigeru is treated to the most splendidly bizarre haircut he’s seen in his life: stranger (in) danger looks like, like a damn _bumblebee_ , all bleached blond hair buzzed short, dark stripes running up the sides. or some kind of roasted marshmallow, maybe, except the stick got stuck to the sides of it and left a mark.

shigeru delicately shrugs his wrist from the guy’s hand.

“right,” he says. “sorry about that. you’re fine? you’re totally fine, just look at you, so i’ll just be…”

“wait,” the guy says. shigeru does, even though he really, really wishes he didn’t.

_i guess oikawa-san’s flying solo for now._

“um.” contrary to popular belief, shigeru’s actually not good at handling confrontation. it’s probably why he manages to get caught up in them so often. “can i help you?”

“do i know you?” bumblebee says at the same time, and yahaba stares at him.

“i’m pretty sure you don’t.”

“…oh.” seriously, someone who looks like _that_ shouldn’t be allowed to sound so small. bumblebee stares down at his shoes, and inexplicably, shigeru thinks of the dog.

bumblebee turns around, starts walking away.

shigeru watches the guy disappear around the corner. he blinks, hesitating.

a few buildings down, there’s a thin screen beneath a billboard, alternating between displaying the date, the weather, and the time. catching sight of the latter shigeru balks, hesitation forgotten as he starts running again, a tailwind slipping between storefronts and trees, rushing him forward.

 

 

 _“but he’s so cute,”_ oikawa gushes, cooing at the dog.

“i told you,” shigeru says again, not really expecting oikawa to listen this time either. “he’s not my dog.”

said dog had found shigeru just as he was getting off work, like it knew shigeru was late this morning and had to stay overtime. now it has its head resting against oikawa’s thigh, the rest of him still lying on top of shigeru, unwilling to move too far way. though his confusion remains, shigeru’s fondness for the dog grows exponentially the longer it hangs around. he strokes along the dog’s back.

to shigeru’s surprise, oikawa replies, “even better, then.”

raising his free hand toward the sky, oikawa continues. “you can’t hide from me, yahaba-chan. this sweetheart,” emphasised with a rub under the dog’s chin, “is not like Any Other Dog.”

“i know,” says shigeru, because he does.

oikawa smiles. it’s softer than his usual, and all the more heartbreaking for it.

“look at how loved you are, yahaba.”

shigeru looks away. 

oikawa’s not the first person to comment on the dog. they’re sitting on one of many benches in front of city hall — there’s a fountain at the centre of the benches, the city hall and cafes within walking distance, which makes it a social hotspot during sunset hour. 

it’s a real pretty sight, actually — people scattered throughout, some with friends, some with lovers, some on their own, but never _truly_ alone, flowers curling around ankles or fuzzy lights surrounding people here and there.

shigeru can’t see oikawa’s heart, but he doesn’t ask about it, doesn’t let himself look too hard for it, either. 

“i wonder,” shigeru says quietly.

oikawa hums, standing up. the dog stands up too, curling over shigeru properly, sniffing at the inside of shigeru’s wrist.

 _ken!_ the dog barks happily. shigeru stares down, but the dog won’t stop, bouncing from one side to another, _ken, shigeru! ken! ken!_

“is that your name?”

the dog rolls onto its belly, and shigeru gives it a rub, laughing.

“ken it is, then.”

when he looks back up, oikawa’s walked up to the fountain. there’s a small rock in his hand, and he throws it up, catches it, throws it up again. his eyes are bright.

lifting his arm, oikawa throws it across the surface of the fountain, and the rock skips once, twice, thrice, four times before disappearing. the ripples along the fountain’s surface remain.

“yahaba-chan,” oikawa says, “don’t leave that dog alone, okay?”

“sure,” yahaba says, reaching back down to give ken another pat, but his hand just meets the denim on his leg.  

sunset hour’s come and gone, and the city seems a little less for it.

 

 

fujiwara-san asks him a few days later: “have you seen anyone around here lately?”

yahaba frowns. “what do you mean?”

“well. we’re supposed to be getting a new tenant any day now, but he doesn’t seem to be appearing.”

ken yips. they both look down and smile.

“not you, dear,” and she bends over to pat ken, who pants happily before nudging back against shigeru’s hand, licking along his wrist. 

“i’ll keep an eye out,” yahaba promises.

“thank you,” says fujiwara-san. “but it’ll be a relief to know when he arrives, i think.”

 

 

it’s raining. so, for the first time since he was hired, shigeru finds himself pulling a shift inside sendai’s disney store instead of handing flyers for it near the station six blocks down. shigeru winces, not looking forward to a drenched walk home in the rain. 

sendai’s skies have been storm-cloud dark all day, and it’s hard to see much from the storefront windows. shigeru’s got no problems hearing, though, so he hears when the bell at the door signals another customer, and he _definitely_ hears the underlying delight in oikawa’s voice when he calls out, “yahaba-chan, your friend’s come to visit.”

shigeru sticks his head out from the stack of mini tsum-tsums he’d been shelving. “my who?”

“your friend,” oikawa’s practically glowing. lowering his voice, oikawa says, “reminds me of your dog, you know? ken-chan! aren’t you lucky, yahaba-chan?”

shigeru practically shoves the tsum-tsums into oikawa’s waiting arms.

walking towards the central part of the store, there’s only one person standing still, looking around like he’s never seen a mickey mouse in his life. employees and other customers bustle around him, but shigeru freezes.

turning back towards oikawa, who has since disappeared, shigeru hisses, “he’s _not_ my friend.”

unsurprisingly, nobody answers.

there’s nothing else for it. shigeru does still work here, after all. steeling himself, he approaches bumblebee, somewhat hoping he’s been forgotten since he knocked him to the ground a few days ago. 

“hi,” he says. the smile he’s pasted onto his face feels fake as hell, and judging from the look on bumblebee’s face, he thinks so, too. or maybe he’s just recognised shigeru. it’s hard to tell. “how can i help you?”

it’s really similar to what he’d told the guy back then, too, and yahaba weeps a little inside.

“not really,” he says, then pauses. shigeru thinks he might be shivering a little. “thought it’d be warmer in here, is all.”

“what?”

“ ’s cold out,” the guy explains, and yahaba refrains from snorting. “been a crazy cold wind since i left the station.” he throws yahaba a Look, and for the briefest second yahaba thinks: _puppy dog eyes_ , before he shoves that thought aside. without knowing why, he feels strangely guilty.

the guy’s not done yet, though. “how the hell do you live like this all the time?”

there’s an easy question to answer: “i don’t.”

 _shigeru,_ comes a soft bark from below. true enough, there ken is, shaking droplets of damp off his fur before flopping into a puddle between shigeru and…

 _oh,_ shigeru thinks. _i should’ve known._

ken keeps whining, _cold, shigeru. shigeru, ken, cold cold cold._

shigeru doesn’t even think, drops down and pulls out a handkerchief for ken at the same time bumblebee — ken sr? actual ken? _well then_ — bends down to ruffle the dog’s fur with a sigh.

and just like that, ken rolls over, rumbling contentedly.

_warm._

shigeru stares at ken, then his hand, how close it is next to the other guy’s, handkerchief aside. he looks up. like this, bumblebee really does look like his puppy dog heart, red-faced and — huh.

it’s kinda cute. just a little. 

“i suppose,” shigeru relents, “you can wait out the rain in here.”

 

 

needless to say, the walk back home is awkward. 

ken sticks to shigeru like he’s the one in their motley trio holding the umbrella (he isn’t) and shigeru _still_ doesn’t know what to call trio member #3 — ‘bumblebee’ feels weird and affectionate (read: _intimate_ ) for a person whose heart shigeru’s slowly been endearing himself to since he moved to this city. 

there’re some giggles following them as they make their way through the streets, ducking over puddles when necessary and slipping under awnings and bus stops when they can. but most likely because they’re both huddled under the same umbrella. shigeru really couldn’t care less. 

the breeze drifting between them feels warm as summer.

“i’ve been meaning to ask,” shigeru says once the silence becomes close to unbearable. “who are you, exactly?”

bumblebee clears his throat. he’s so red he looks like he could die any second.

“…. ‘m not so hot at explaining stuff.”

shigeru refuses to accept this. “try me.”

“your apartment complex,” he begins. “i’m supposed to have moved in a few days ago, but the movers were booked up so i’ve put it off till now.”

it’s neither the greatest nor easiest place to start an explanation, but it does let things start to make sense in shigeru’s head, so he doesn’t say anything.

“i didn’t — i don’t — mean to weird you out or anything, but by the time i realised you lived there too it was kinda hard to introduce myself, ‘cause, you know…”

“ken,” shigeru finishes, relieved he understands despite everything else.

there’s a mumble beside him. shigeru says, “well, don’t let me keep you waiting.”

“…kentarou,” he repeats. “my full name is kyoutani kentarou.”

oh — _ken._

shigeru very strongly suspects he’s going red, too. 

“yahaba shigeru,” he replies. “i’ve, um. i’ve been looking after your dog during sunset hour.”

“i know,” ken — _kyoutani_ says. “he loves you a lot. i can feel it,” he knocks a fist against his chest, “here.”

“and you? what about you,” shigeru manages to say. he’s definitely burning now, he can feel it.

“i’ve,” kyoutani’s voice is rough and so, so very quiet. “wanted to really know you for a while now, too.”

 

 

 

they stop in front of the apartment complex. it isn’t raining anymore.

“yeah. it’s nice to meet you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> (all the places mentioned throughout the fic are actual places that exist irl, but here are some helpful reference images to give you an idea of exactly what yahaba was seeing:
> 
> sendai city at sunset: [(x)](http://www.photostaud.com/img/fotogalerie/city-album/japan-sendai-city-008.3.jpg)  
> yahaba's apartment complex: [(x)](http://www.photostaud.com/img/fotogalerie/city-album/japan-sendai-city-001.3.jpg)  
> the fountain in front of city hall: [(x)](http://static.panoramio.com/photos/large/22850007.jpg)  
> puppy!kyoutani: [(x)](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/c2/48/eb/c248ebeee9c7e95d754d7f0a14f53746.jpg))
> 
> thank you for reading!  
> [tumblr](http://aobaejousai.tumblr.com), [twitter](http://twitter.com/kitaiichis)


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